You Said You Wanted Us to Break Up - Chapter 112

At first, I thought I was seeing things.

Sioden Raslet was not the kind of person one would expect to run into in the palace hallway leading to the audience chamber.

However, when the man turned his head upon hearing my voice, I realized that the person before me was no illusion.

At the same time, it hit me that I had made a mistake with how I addressed him.

Calling someone by their name when we were soon to be strangers wasn’t exactly a crime, but it wasn’t something I felt particularly inclined to do.

“Duke Raslet.”

When I corrected the title belatedly, Sioden, who had been standing at a distance, approached me.

Up close, the man looked a bit thinner and paler than when we last met. Since he was originally a man of good build, his tall stature and broad frame remained, but he did not look like someone who had been doing well.

His lips moved a few times as if he were picking his words, and then he gave a small laugh. It was a dry laugh, intended to slightly ease the awkwardness.

“I’m not sure what to call you that wouldn’t be rude.”

From his perspective, it was understandably awkward. Since I had called him Duke Raslet, etiquette dictated that he maintain a corresponding distance, but having called me by my name for so long, other titles wouldn’t come naturally to him.

It was also because our titles hadn’t been fully sorted out since the marriage was still technically in effect.

There was no need to dwell on such matters for long.

“The marriage hasn’t been annulled yet, so just call me by my name.”

The man nodded slightly without a word.

“I didn’t know you had arrived in the capital.”

“I was planning to write a letter after finishing my audience.”

A lord with military power above a certain level was required to have an audience with the Emperor as soon as they entered the capital.

Sioden would have been no exception.

Since I had something I wanted to find out through him, it was right that we speak more, but the timing wasn’t ideal. After a moment of hesitation, I spoke to him.

“I have a schedule to keep right now, so I must go.”

“…….”

“I’ll send a letter once I return home. I hope we can set a date to talk.”

Sioden agreed readily, without even asking for a reason.

“Understood.”

“Then, I shall take my leave first.”

Leaving only those words, the man gave a short bow and stepped back. His behavior, displaying a polite sense of distance, was so composed that I found myself naturally following suit.

Walking down the hallway away from Sioden, I realized belatedly that I hadn’t even asked him which address I should send the letter to.

* * *

Inside the audience chamber, Beatrice was waiting for me.

“Count, it’s been a while.”

Greeting me with a bright smile, the woman explained,

“I called you here this time to apologize for the previous rudeness. I hadn’t realized the Count knew nothing about the tea offered by an Emperor.”

A question arose at those words. I asked her in a cautious tone,

“If you had known beforehand that I knew nothing of the tea, would you have chosen not to give it to me?”

“No.”

Denying it flatly, the Emperor curled the corners of her lips.

“I still would have given it to you. An apology is far cheaper than failing to verify someone.”

It was a familiar logic. If I put myself in Beatrice’s shoes, it was an attitude that felt quite rational.

As I pondered how to respond to an answer that didn’t even attempt to hide its underlying intent, Beatrice spoke.

“But my apology is sincere. There is nothing more vulgar than being unkind to the ignorant and the innocent, is there?”

It was a statement rooted in the typical conventions of Southern high society. In the South, it was considered uncouth for the powerful to refuse to show tolerance. In fact, the most common way for someone to display their superiority was to project an air of generosity.

Beatrice likely wasn’t saying this out of a genuine respect for social etiquette. Shrewd people do not worship refinement; they merely utilize it as they see fit.

If it was the custom for the strong to show tolerance, then the proper etiquette for the weak was to accept that generosity with gratitude. By apologizing to me, Beatrice was essentially declaring that she would leave herself with nothing to feel guilty about.

“In that case, would you be willing to show me a little more kindness?”

“In what way?”

“Why did you ask for my mother’s name?”

“I was curious.”

After that simple answer, the emperor tilted her head slightly and looked down at me.

“Weren’t you curious, Count? How did a woman who was the formal wife of Duke Rowen vanish from history without leaving so much as a line of her name behind?”

“Of course, it is only right that I should be curious.”

“And?”

“But to Your Majesty, isn’t my mother simply someone who has been buried beneath a tombstone for a long time?”

Before coming to the palace, I had asked Iswen various things about the current emperor.

“The Emperor has no intention of suppressing Rowen. However, she is not favorable toward us either. This is because she believes Rowen interfered excessively with the Imperial Family during the previous generation.”

That was one of the answers I had received at the time.

If the Emperor avoided the Rowen family for such reasons, then her interest in my mother—who was indisputably a member of that family—could also be classified as “excessive interference.”

The Emperor stared at me intently before bursting into laughter.

“Indeed, you are right.”

Acquiescing with a lighthearted laugh, she continued to gaze at me with eyes still brimming with amusement.

“There is nothing more unpleasant than an outsider poking around in one’s family affairs. I despised your father for doing such things, yet here I am doing the exact same thing myself.”

“……”

“Since the Count is this intelligent, I wonder why your father tried to raise you to be a mere parakeet?”

I doubted the Emperor was complimenting me out of pure sincerity. However, what I had to do now was make myself appear more valuable than I actually was.

I lifted my head and met the woman’s eyes directly.

“It was because he lacked the insight to judge a person’s potential.”

“……”

“That is why he is no longer with us.”

“True. Men without insight are destined to live short lives.”

Nodding in agreement once again, Beatrice waved her hand. Let’s end the small talk here and return to the main point.

Speaking in an indifferent tone, she stared at me.

“Will you accept my apology?”

“No.”

The woman’s brow twitched slightly. It was an expression of irritation rather than flustered confusion.

Before the initiative I had seized through my unpredictable behavior could shift back to her, I spoke.

“It is not an apology born from a place of genuine remorse.”

Though the Emperor claimed her apology was sincere, what she truly felt was likely not guilt but a minor inconvenience.

“Some apologies,” the Emperor remarked, “have value even if they are only words.”

“You are right.”

Even Sioden’s apology had guaranteed me a temporary sense of power.

An apology from the emperor would surely be more valuable than that.

And yet, that value would be even emptier than the power gained from Sioden’s words of regret.

There was no need to repeat a lesson I had already learned.

“However, I do not wish to sell something at a bargain price when I can receive a much higher one.”

The Emperor narrowed her eyes a bit more.

“Are you saying my apology is a bargain?”

“I am saying I know you are someone who can pay a far greater price than an apology that is merely words.”

I knew these words were audacious.

However, Beatrice would likely accept whatever I said, as long as I didn’t cross the line too far.

She would judge that it was better to turn a blind eye to my rudeness than to make an enemy of Iswen.

To her, I was one of the weights on the scale to be used when dealing with Iswen. I knew exactly what form such a deal took. It was a transaction I had already made several times regarding my father and Apple’s safety.

Beatrice stared at me blankly for a moment before speaking.

“You have a talent for bargaining. You should study economics.”

“Thank you for the advice.”

The woman’s eyes thinned slightly. To top it off, the corners of her mouth, already curved, rose even higher.

For the first time, she asked in a serious voice.

“As the price for forgetting my rudeness, what is the appropriate payment in the Count’s mind?”

* * *

After finishing my conversation with Beatrice, I felt as though all the strength had been drained from my body.

When I returned home exhausted, Apple, who had been waiting for me, came running.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

I was just mentally fatigued; it wasn’t as if anything terrible had happened.

I said to Apple, who was looking at me with worried eyes:

“I’m going out for a ride.”

I wanted to cool my head a bit while feeling the wind.

Later, as Apple helped adjust my riding habit after I changed, she asked,

“Shall I come with you?”

“It’s fine.”

Apple doesn’t know how to ride a horse yet. It was different for me; I had gone out for rides with Demian several times and was now capable of roaming the forest near the mansion alone. I didn’t want Apple to wait in the fields by herself while I was running through the forest.

Taking Mari’s reins from the knight who had gone to the stables while I was changing, I said to Apple:

“Instead, why don’t you go to the stables? There’s something I want you to see.”

Apple looked like she didn’t suspect a thing, but she nodded obediently.

I smiled quietly as I watched her walk toward the stables.

In the stables was a grey horse I had brought for Apple. After I received Mari from Demian, I had asked Ian to bring a horse with a gentle temperament and good endurance.

Apple will like it. Although she didn’t show it much, she enjoyed physical activities. Thinking about how happy she would be already made me feel proud.

I reached the clearing where I first began my riding lessons with Iswen and climbed onto Mari’s back.

This clearing was connected to a small forest. It was a forest that had been part of the Rowen estate for a long time. Of course, the entire forest didn’t belong to Rowen; I had heard it was connected to the villas of high-ranking Southern nobles, though I had never ventured that far.

As I entered the forest and took the path I had traveled several times with Demian, I retraced the conversation I had with Beatrice.